


Crash and Burn

by Zethsaire



Series: Mirror Verse [3]
Category: Young Avengers
Genre: Bad Parenting, Child Abuse, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, M/M, Self-Destruction, self-abuse, self-neglect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2017-12-03 15:51:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/699947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zethsaire/pseuds/Zethsaire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Thomas Erik Maximoff is his own worst enemy.  The rest of the time, he's everybody else's.</p>
<p>Set in Mirror 'verse.  The alternate version of Tommy, aka Crash Course, is hopelessly hooked on drugs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crash and Burn

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Explicit languages, references to past child abuse and terrible parenting. Features drug use/addiction, and while this version of Tommy is not *depressed* per se, he is very self destructive, and if that is a trigger for you, you probably shouldn't read this fic.
> 
> As stated in the summary, this is Mirror Tommy, brother to Will from the previous Mirror fic I posted. He and Will are the biological sons of the Scarlet Witch. As in most Mirror 'verse stories, the characters have not had great lives, everything is terrible, and the good guys are villains. They also have the multi-dimensional technology mentioned in DangerousCommieSubversive's Multiverse fics.
> 
> The Mirror 'verse was originally thought of by DCS, though we've both been writing in it and swapping ideas back and forth.

Crash and Burn

Everything had started going downhill when he met Roy. Things were shitty already, and he'd had a really fucking bad day; worse than usual.

He hadn't slept in almost a week. He'd called Pietro about it, but his uncle was no help at all. “Just lock it down, Thomas. Just focus, and control your powers. It's not hard – you should have gotten this by now.”

Easy for him to say. Pietro didn't have any problems reacting to normal people. Crash didn't know how he did it. Everyone just moved so fucking _slow_ , he couldn't keep up. He just sped past them in every sense of the word, and it just kept getting worse and worse. Will had hit the ceiling of his powers years ago, and run off with Loki for a while, and came back acting like he was a fucking god himself. Crash's powers didn't ever stop. He just kept getting faster and faster, no end in sight, no stop to his growth. He put on a heavy ass armored suit, and even that didn't slow him down anymore.

He used to take sleeping pills at night, to shut his brain off so he could sleep. His mom had started that little ritual. He'd be running around, having fun, and Will would want to go to bed, and his mom would say, "Mommy's trying not to fragment reality again. Take one of her candies and go to bed." He'd been using sleeping pills since he was five.

And so there he was, in another 'verse, and Will had ditched him for Dorrek, like he always did, and it was no fun killing people by himself, and there was this red haired guy, just standing there, spouting some shit about speedsters and wouldn’t he like something to help him come down to Earth for a while. First sample was free. And Thomas didn't have any money for this 'verse, so free sounded pretty damned good to him.

So this crazy drug lord, Roy, had shown him how to tie a tourniquet and stick a needle in his vein the right way, and he'd shot up right there in the middle of the street. And it had been...wonderful.

Everything just sort of...fell into place. Crash didn't know if he slowed down or if the world sped up, but he finally felt _connected_ to everything. He could move through the world at the same pace as everybody else; he could actually sleep through the _night_ for once.

It had been great until the withdrawal set in. He'd never been that sick in his entire life. Speedsters didn't get sick, really. His body fought infection off as fast as it did everything else, and Wanda never had any patience when Will was sick, so she'd just make it go away. 

So when he'd woken up feverish and trembling and nauseous and vomiting all over the place, he'd asked Roy what the hell was wrong with him. And Roy had just laughed and said he'd feel better if he shot up again. But he didn't have any money here, so Roy fucked him instead. He'd had sex before, loads of times, but never like that. He'd never been anyone's _whore_ before. He'd always been the one fucking the whores.

And Will had finally found him and taken him home. Pietro had been completely disgusted with him and said a lot of things that Crash had heard him use to describe other people, usually humans, but they'd never been directed at _him_ before. He'd always gotten along with his uncle, and now Pietro didn't want to have anything to do with him.

Everything else just sort of fell apart after that. Nothing was fun any more unless he was high. He couldn't deal with life at his normal speed, not after having a taste of what it was like for everybody else. Even watching all seven of his TVs at the same time couldn’t hold his attention without a hit, not even when he turned the playback speed all the way up.

Killing was the only thing that really reached him any more. Even the sex didn't touch him. Even when it was rough and hard and painful and someone had him bent over the nearest flat surface, fucking him raw, it didn't really register. Will's disappointment reached him sometimes, when he healed Crash from yet another bad sexual encounter, or contracted STD, or burst vein from shooting up so much. But he'd never been able to keep up with his twin, no matter how fast he'd been. 

Will was gorgeous and strong and so in _control_ of everything, and had a huge, towering, powerful fucking husband. And Crash was pale and washed out and thin and stupid and miserable. And he was a whore. He knew he was, a whore and a fucking junkie, and every time he might have forgotten it, Pietro was right there to remind him. But it didn't matter, because he just didn't care.

“Thomas? Thomas are you in there?”

“...” Crash was laying on his bed, staring up at the little glow-in-the-dark stars Pietro had put on the ceiling for him when he was eight, and thought glow-in-the-dark was the coolest thing ever. Will used to use his magic and make them dance, and Thomas would take his sleeping pill and watch them until he fell asleep, curled around the other half of his soul.

Will slept with Dorrek now, in a huge bed where Crash wasn't wanted. He slept alone, unless he was being fucked by someone who decided they wanted a cuddle afterwords. He still fell asleep staring at his glow-in-the-dark stars, but they didn't dance anymore.

“Crash?”

“What do you _want,_ Will?” Will always wanted something. Wanted him to eat, or sleep, or go outside in the fucking sunlight. He never just let Thomas _be_. 

“I brought you food.”

“I'm not hungry.” He was never hungry any more. He used to like food, he was pretty sure, but he ate so much of it, it all just started tasting the same after a while. What was the point? He'd just throw it up again.

“I'm coming in now,” Will said, like Crash could really stop him. No one could stop Will from doing anything he really wanted to do. And if they did manage it, he'd just wave his magical fucking hand and get what he wanted anyways.

Will came in, and put the tray he was carrying down on the night stand. His twin reached over and ran his hand through Thomas' stringy, tangled hair. He'd had nice hair once, like Will's. It looked like shit now, just like the rest of him.

“Hygiene, Thomas. It's a thing. When was the last time you took a shower?”

“I don't know.”

“When was the last time you ate? Have you eaten anything since the last time I brought you food?”

“I don't know.” 

“How long have you been laying here, anyways? Dorrek and I have been gone for days.”

“I don't know.”

“Jesus, Thomas, how much did you _take_?”

“I don't-”

“Know. Yeah. I got that. C'mon. We're going to get you cleaned up.” Will grabbed Thomas under the arms, and grimaced when he lifted Thomas up far too easily.

“...why?”

“Because I care about you, you idiot.” Will hauled him across his room and into the bathroom. He dumped Thomas unceremoniously in the jacuzzi and started filling it up. The warm water felt good; Crash hadn't even realized how cold he was.

“But you have Dorrek. You don't need me.” Thomas didn't even flinch when Will dumped a bucket of hot, soapy water over his head. He just blinked and rubbed the soap out of his eyes.

“I love Dorrek, but he isn't you.” Will poured shampoo over his head, and started rubbing it into his scalp with his long, elegant fingers. It felt good. Crash leaned back into his brother's touch. He couldn't even remember the last time someone touched him like that, without wanting something from him.

“Dorrek wasn't there when we were growing up. Dorrek didn't hide me when Mom went on a rampage. Dorrek didn't hold me when I woke up from a nightmare. Dorrek didn't protect me, when Grandpa wanted to take us away. You're my twin, Thomas. Everyone else can go fuck themselves, but if I lost you I don't know what I'd do.”

“Avenge me in a brutal fashion.”

“If by that you mean completely go off my rocker and crack the world in half with my powers, then, yeah.” More water was dumped over his head, and Will started scrubbing his skin. The water was slowly turning a disconcerting shade of brown. “You're not allowed to leave me.”

“I'll do better.”

“No you won't.” Will almost managed to sound sad.

“I'll try,” he said, because there wasn’t anything else _to_ say.

Will drained the water and pulled him up on his feet. He wrapped Crash in a huge, fuzzy towel and dried him off. Then he dressed him in some pajamas and brought him back to bed. Then he brought out a bowl of water, shaving cream, a razor, and a hand towel. He lathered up Thomas' face, and shaved him gently with a straight razor, not even nicking him once. He wiped Thomas' face clean when he was finished, and magic'd the items away.

“I'm going to feed you now, and you're going to eat every bite. You understand?”  


“Yes.”

And he did. He ate everything Will gave him, and he didn't throw up after, because Will would be angry. Will pulled the covers up and ruffled his now clean hair. “Get some sleep.”

And he turned to go. Thomas reached out and latched onto his sleeve. “Don't leave me.”

“I can't stay Thomas, I've got stuff to do.” Will sounded annoyed.

“Please.”

“Alright, for a little while.” And Will climbed up into bed with him, and pulled Thomas' head down onto his shoulder.

“You used to make the stars dance,” Crash said, staring at the ceiling like always.

“You want them to dance? You're really in a mood today, aren't you.” But he waved his hand anyway, and the stars came to life, twirling and swirling around the white tile sky.

And Thomas could pretend, for a moment, that they were happy. That Will really loved him, and wasn't just in one of his moods where he needed to care for something other than himself. And that Thomas wasn't broken, and that his powers weren't out of control, and that he was normal and happy. And maybe that was Will's magic, too, because he'd never been happy, but he was right now, in this moment. He held onto that feeling until he fell asleep.


End file.
